! I had forgotten! Yes, tell him; he is a first class
chap, he'll understand, and, I say"--and he pulled some sovereigns from
his pocket--"do give him these from me for this term."

Then with a smile he went.

And a few minutes afterwards a small, slender boy of fourteen, with only
Eton's own inimitable self-confidence and delicious swagger printed upon
his every line, drove up to the door, and, paying for the taxi in a
lordly way, came into his mother's morning-room. There had been a gap in
the family after Tristram's appearance, caused by the death, from
diphtheria, of two other boys; then came the two girls of twenty and
nineteen respectively and, lastly, Cyril.

His big, blue eyes rounded with astonishment and interest when he heard
the important news. All he said was:

"Well, she must be a corker, if Tristram thinks her good enough. But
what a beastly nuisance! He won't go to Canada now, I suppose, and we
shan't have that ranch."

CHAPTER VI

Francis Markrute also saw his niece at breakfast--or rather--just after
it. She was finishing hers in the little upstairs sitting-room which he
had allotted to her for her personal use, when he tapped at the door and
asked if he might come in.

She said "yes," and then rose, with the ceremonious politeness she
always used in her dealings with him--contemptuous, resentful politeness
for the most part.

"I have come to settle the details of your marriage," he said, while he
waved her to be seated again and took a chair himself. At the word
"marriage" her nostrils quivered, but she said nothing. She was always
extremely difficult to deal with, on account of these silences of hers.
She helped no one out. Francis Markrute knew the method himself and
admired it; it always made the other person state his case.

"You saw Lord Tancred last night. You can have no objection to him on
the ground of his person, and he is a very great gentleman, my niece, as
you will find."

Still silence.

"I have arranged with him for you to be married in October--about the
25th, I suppose. So now comes the question of your trousseau. You must
have clothes to fit you for so great a position. You had better get them
in Paris." Then he paused, struck by the fact which he had only just
noticed, that the garments she had been wearing and those she now wore
were shabby enough. He realized the reason he had not before remarked
this--her splendid carriage and air of breeding--and it gave him